04/02/26 Holy Thursday: Everything is Given

I hope today's homily inspires and motivates you, and I also hope that it leaves you hungry

for the one who gave everything to feed you.

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A reading from the Holy Gospel, according to John. "Always to you, O Lord." Chapter 13 verses 1-15. Before the Feast of Passover, Jesus knew that his hour had come to pass from this world to the Father.

He loved his own in the world, and he loved them to the end. The devil had already induced Judas Son of Simon the Ascarion to hand him over, so during supper, fully aware that the Father had put everything in his power. And that he had come from God and was returning to God. He rose from supper, and took off his outer garments.

He took a towel and tied it around his waist, then he poured water into a basin and began to wash that cypals feet and dry them with the towel around his waist. He came to Simon Peter, who said to him, "Master, are you going to wash my feet?" Jesus answered and said to him, "What I am doing, you do not understand now, but you will understand later."

Peter said to him, "You will never wash my feet."

Jesus answered him, "And unless I wash you, you will have no inheritance with me." Simon Peter said to him, "Master, the not only my feet, but my hands on my head as well." Jesus said to him, "Whatever has bathed, has no need except to have his feet washed for he is clean all over." So you are clean, but not all.

For he knew who would betray him, for this reason he said, "Not all of you are clean." So when he had washed their feet and put his garments back on and reclined at table again, he said to him, "Do you realize what I have done for you? You call me teacher and master and rightly so for indeed I am. If I therefore, the master and teacher have washed your feet, you ought to wash one

another's feet.

“I have given you a model to follow, so that as I have done for you, you should also do.”

The Gospel of the Lord. Jesus Christ. I did have a seat.

So I remember the very first time I ever met a man named Kirk Cameron.

I said, "Kirk, I want to tell you three things and I'll get back to that in a little bit tonight is kind of a conclusion of Lent. We continue it through the next few days, but tonight is the last day, Mark's the last last, this mass right now, Mark's the last moments of Lent. In all of Lent, what is Lent all through Lent?

The word is give, right? The word is just give. So prayer and fasting and almsgiving, it's all about giving. So in prayer, we're giving God time, we're giving God attention. In fasting, we're giving up something and then almsgiving, we're giving help, right?

These are all of the last 40 days have been meant to be marked by that one word give. We give our time and attention and prayer. We give up something in fasting, we give help through almsgiving and I imagine that, you know, we get to the end of our day like this, we are on Holy Thursday and we're like, yeah, I did it or I didn't do it, right?

It's kind of that sense of, okay, the last 40 days I can look back and think, okay, did it happen or did it not happen? Did I check the box or did it not check the box? Did I accomplish the task or did I not? Did I do the thing or did I not do the thing and sometimes you miss the motive, right?

Sometimes we could say, I did it, but why did I do it? Look over the last 40 days, maybe you did it, maybe didn't do it, but what was your motive? What was my motive?

“I think it's really important, we asked this question not only for our own hearts, but”

also because the whole point of life is to be like Jesus, so here is Jesus. On this night, especially we see this so clearly, on this night, Jesus gives, he gives, he gives everything, in fact, if there's one thing that marks today is the fact that everything is given. Here's Jesus, that the last supper and any strips himself of his garments, normally

would have a washing of feet in your parish, they'll have the bishop or your pastor, your priest. We'll strip off the outer garments and wash people's feet, we don't do that here today, but they'll do that because why? Because Jesus gave that, he gave this service, he gave it, he gave this humility, he gave

the dignity, stripped himself of this, he gave everything, that he gives the, he shared

me and he establishes the priesthood."

Jesus, at the last supper, he gives the Eucharist. And that is what the Eucharist is him, right, is his body blood, soul and divinity of Jesus. And so we know this, that Jesus gives, on this night, if there's anything to walk away with, it's the fact that everything is given, everything is given, but here's the question, why?

Why does Jesus give? The fact I love this because, in John's Gospel, John gives the answer, he digs it so clear, John, John even begins this, this section, this chapter 13, by saying the exactly this, that Jesus knew that his hour had come to pass from this world to the Father. He loved his own in the world and he loved them to the end, the motive of Jesus, like

why did he give?

“Remember, everything is given, why did he give?”

What was his motive?

His motive is, he loved his own in the world and he loved them to the end.

The motive is love. We look over the last 40 days and think, okay, I gave up X, Y, or I gave time and attention to the Lord and prayer, or I gave help in some way to people who needed help. Why? In our hearts, we need to match your actions and our hearts need to match Jesus' heart.

He, on this night, everything is given, why? He loved his own in the world and he loved them to the end. The motive was love. The motive is love, even the very fact that God has given us this, the mass right now. Why?

The motive is love, having loved his own in the world, he loved them to the end. He loves you, but there's something even deeper that carries Christ's motive, this love, and our motive has to be love, but we also have to ask the question, when did Jesus give?

“Remember, on tonight, everything is given, when did he give and he and John makes it so clear?”

He says it kind of twice, he says, Jesus knew that his hour had come to pass from this world to the Father and later on he says, "Fully aware that the Father had put everything into his power and that he had come from the God and was returning to God, he took a towel and that's when he washes their feet. That's when he gives everything, that's when everything is given, when he was fully aware."

This is so important. I think we could say, "Okay, yeah, God loves me when I'm doing well. God loves me when I'm good. God loves me when I behave. God loves me when I am without flaws, when I'm without faults.

God loves me when I haven't fallen down and yet here it's so clear in the Scriptures. So clear in this moment that here is Jesus and everything is given and it's why is it given? It's because he loves and when does he love them? He loves them when he knows all of their, he knows it all.

He knows that they're going to betray, he knows they're going to run away, he knows that they're going to fall asleep, he knows that they're going to deny him in the midst of knowing everything, knowing that they're going to fail him, knowing that these people that he loves so much will not love him back. That's the moment.

“That's when everything is given and this is true for us, right?”

I think again, sometimes I think we fall into this trap, we've said it before, but we fall into this trap of thinking that our sins disqualify us from God's love, that we fall into this trap of thinking that our sins surprise God or shock God and we forget the

reality and the reality is he already knew it when he picked up his cross when he on

this night when everything is given, Jesus already knew all of our sins and he did it anyways, remember, scripture says fully aware, he knows all of it and it's that moment, it's that moment that everything is given. Jesus is under no illusions on this night that if I do this for them, they'll be perfect. We know it's the truth, I'm doing this for them because they need it, not because they

deserve it. Here we are. God loves us because we need it, not because we deserve it and he loves us most powerfully and loves us most deeply and the moment we need him the most and deserve him the least. The moment the moment we've even told him we don't want him, that's the moment when

everything is given. So I don't know if you know what Kirk Cameron is, but Kirk Cameron was a teen actor, a young actor, back when I was a kid and he's on the movie "Growing Pains" and it was

he comments on things, anyways, we were out of pro-life dinner at one point, my first

“met him and we were sitting at this table and I said, Kirk Cameron, I want to tell you”

three things and I said number one, I want to thank you because when I was a high schooler, as a Christian, as a Catholic, you coming out as a Christian in Hollywood was just so inspiring to me, I didn't know any other major actors, people who were really, really popular, who were Christians and you were spoken in your Christianity, it just really helped me as a high schooler to know that others someone in Hollywood who also was a Christian and I just want to thank

you for that. He said, okay, cool. I said number two is my uncle, one of my uncles, was a writer and a producer of a TV show that his little sister was on, his little sister is Candice Cameron and she was on the TV show "Full House" and my uncle was one of the writers and a producer of "Full House"

and so then Kirk's other sister was with him at the dinner. He's like, oh my gosh, I know your uncle's time, I'm like, no way, that's so cool. It was great.

And I said, the third thing I need to tell you is, your movie fireproof.

He's like, yeah, you're movie fireproof, I watch every good Friday during Holy Week and he's like, really, so the movie fireproof is this movie about his wife. I told him, I said, the movie fireproof is about a man, he's a firefighter and he's married to his wife, his name is Caleb Hernam is Katherine. And basically the ultimate upshot of the story is, is a story of a husband who loves his wife

who doesn't love him back.

“Like if you want to summarize it in one sentence, but that's the story.”

And at first, you know, the story starts up with him having a pretty broken marriage. Caleb is not great, Katherine is not doing great. But the ultimate story is of a husband who loves his wife who doesn't love him back. Part of Katherine's story back story is, again, it's a cheesy Christian movie's list has given it that out of the way.

It is, but I'm telling you, if you watch it, you might feel, you might be some tears. But here's Katherine, her mom has suffering from dementia, her mom has all these massive medical bills and Caleb, her Cameron's character, he can't be bothered to pay her bills and stuff. In fact, he's got this private account or a separate account for himself that he's been

saving up for years, basically his entire working career, his entire life, and his saving

“up to buy, like this pretty massive boat, and this is his obsession, his side quest of life.”

The story goes on, you know, he's pursuing her, he's loving her, she's kind of flirting with his doctor at her work, and one point, she even tells him, "I do not love you." And it just crushes him, because you don't, she's like, "No, I don't." Is a story unfolds towards the end, turns out there's an anonymous donor that paid for all of Katherine's mom's medical bills and Katherine's thinking that was must be this

wealthy doctor she's been flirting with, and there's this moment. This dramatic moment where she realizes that it was actually her husband Caleb who had done this anonymously, without her knowing it. He had taken all that he had saved up for his whole career, his whole life, all he had saved up, because he knew that it mattered to his wife's mom and to his wife.

He gave it for her, and in teller. But the climax is this, the climax is the moment she realizes that he gave all that money, he gave everything he had saved up. Not only after she had told them, "I do not love you." He gave it after she had served him divorce papers.

After she had said, "I want a life apart from you. I don't want anything to do with you anymore." That was the moment, and he knew that was the moment that he gave everything. That's the moment that everything was given. That was the moment that touched her heart, realizing that he had done all of this, that

everything is given when he was fully aware that she did not love him back, and she wanted a life apart from him. That was the moment that everything is given, and so I'm talking to Kirk Cameron at this dinner and saying, "That's the reason why I watch every good Friday because we recognize tonight, tonight everything is given."

It's given why, it's given because of love, it's given when Jesus knew, the last thing.

When Jesus knew everything, you and I are embarrassed by it.

“Jesus knew everything, you and I hate about ourselves when Jesus knew everything about”

every detail of our lives, that's the moment that He loved us the most.

On Jesus fully aware, and knowing everything about your heart and my heart and your

“brokenness and my brokenness, that is the moment when the God of love takes everything”

He's been given, and everything is given for you.